IT czar Nilekani comes up trumps in UID war

The year-long turf war between Unique Identification Authority of India chairman Nandan Nilekani and home minister P. Chidambaram over the collection of biometrics for issuing a unique ID card to all residents has emphatically been decided in favour of the former IT czar.

The cabinet committee on UIDAI on Friday even gave a go ahead to enroll an additional 40 crore residents for the Aadhaar number, with a budget of over `8,814 crore in 16 states.

The government had billed the Aadhaar project as a one-stop measure to pass the benefits of developmental schemes to the marginalised sections.

With Rahul Gandhi prominently advocating Aadhaar's multiple benefits in his speeches in election- bound states, the UPA government could not have ignored this.

However, to save face, the national population register, under the home ministry, will collect biometric data in the remaining 60 crore population, not covered by UIDAI. Both initiatives will continue simultaneously to finish work by June 2013.

THE DEAL

Biometric data to be collected by only one authority. If a person has already received a UID number, then his biometrics will not be collected by the NPR. This will avoid duplication of work.

Uidai's mandate increased to issue 40 crore more UID numbers, taking its total target to 60 crore. It will continue collecting biometrics in 16 states and UTs, while NPR will do so for residents who have not enrolled for the Aadhaar project and the rest of the states.

To address the issue of data duplication, the cabinet committee decided that in cases where the UID has already captured biometrics details, the NPR will mention the Aadhaar number on its card.

'Under NPR, everyone will be asked if they have given their biometric details and if they have then we will not take it,' Chidambaram said.

Still, in five per cent of the cases, there are chances of duplication and in case of any discrepancies between the UIDAI data and the NPR data, NPR will prevail, he added.

To address the security concerns raised by Chidambaram, the UIDAI will think afresh on its system before resuming its work from April.

Nilekani said: 'We will review the security concerns in the next six to eight weeks and begin the process of collection of data from April.'

This will be done by the inter-ministerial co-ordination committee (IMCC) already constituted by the Union home ministry.

'Pending this approval, UIDAI is allowed to continue Aadhaar enrolment beyond 20 crore so that the momentum of the field formations is not lost. Provision will be made in the budget for 2012-13 in anticipation thereof.'